We Need a Futurama for Israel and the Jewish People

“I have seen the future.”

Who would be so bold to wear a pin that makes this claim?  

This was the pin handed out to all visitors to “Futurama” at the General Motors pavilion at the 1939 World’s Fair in New York City.  Futurama was a ride that took visitors through scenes from the far off future of 1960 showing expressways that connected cities, and efficient highways that brought people from the suburbs to the downtown.   

The pavilion was considered to have a remarkable degree of realism, and gave a glimpse of the future.  The 1939 world’s fair also gave a glimpse of a future Jewish state, and the fair grounds were later the scene of a critical event in the establishment of the state.

Not far from Futurama was the Jewish-Palestine Pavilion, a joint project of the Jewish community in the land of Israel and of Zionist organizations in America including the Jewish  National Fund, the Zionist Organization of America, Hadassah and the Karen Hayesod.  That pavilion tried to will the State into existence.  Its exhibits all came from the land of Israel and showed all the progress and developments there in health, culture, industry and agriculture that demonstrated readiness for statehood and willingness to be the home to all of the imperilled Jews of Europe. 

More information about the pavilion is available at https://herzlcollection.com/worlds-fairs.

The New York City pavilion on the fair grounds was in 1947 the makeshift home of the General Assembly of the United Nations.  It was in this building that the UN Partition Resolution of November 29, 1947 that called for the creation of Jewish state was passed.

The building is now the Queens Museum which features at its entrance a plaque that sets out three significant United Nations events that took place there.  They are the October 23, 1946 declaration by President  Truman that the United States is abandoning its policy of isolationism, the December 11, 1946 establishment of the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund UNICEF) and the November 19, 1947 “adoption of  Resolution 181 to implement the Plan of Partition of Palestine leading to the May 11, 1949 adoption of Resolution 273 to admit Israel to membership in the United Nations.”

The future for the Jewish people was indeed foretold on the 1939 world’s fair grounds.

What do we each see for the future for Israel and the Jewish people?  It would be nice to have a Futurama to show us it will all turn out ok.  Without one, it is up to each of us to make sure that it does.

For more treasures from the Herzl and Zionism Collection of David Matlow which appears weekly in the Canadian Jewish News see  https://herzlcollection.com/treasure-trove